Uksuum Cauyai: Drums of Winter, also referred to only as Drums of Winter (1977

1977 in film

The year 1977 in film involved some significant events.-Events:*In the Academy Awards, Peter Finch, Faye Dunaway and Beatrice Straight win Best Actor and Actress and Supporting Actress awards for Network....

) is a ethnographic documentary

Documentary film

Documentary films constitute a broad category of nonfictional motion pictures intended to document some aspect of reality, primarily for the purposes of instruction or maintaining a historical record...

 on the culture of the Yup'ik people, focusing primarily on dance, music, and potlatch

Potlatch

A potlatch is a gift-giving festival and primary economic system practiced by indigenous peoples of the Pacific Northwest Coast of Canada and United States. This includes Heiltsuk Nation, Haida, Nuxalk, Tlingit, Makah, Tsimshian, Nuu-chah-nulth, Kwakwaka'wakw, and Coast Salish cultures...

 traditions in the community of Emmonak, on the shore of the Bering Sea

Bering Sea

The Bering Sea is a marginal sea of the Pacific Ocean. It comprises a deep water basin, which then rises through a narrow slope into the shallower water above the continental shelves....

. The film was produced through a "community-collaborative process" in which the subjects of the documentary had significant input as to the film's content and presentation. As a result, the film features conversations with individual Yup'ik in place of "the voice-over commentary by an unseen narrator that destroys the cinematic integrity of so many so-called ethnographic films".

Drums of Winter won awards at a number of film festivals, including the American Film Festival

American Film Festival

American Film Festival is a film festival held annually in October in Wrocław, Poland. First edition was held from 20 to 24 October 2010. The festival is organized by Stowarzyszenie Nowe Horyzonty and co-funded by the Wroclaw Municipality and Polish Ministry of Culture and National Heritage.-...

 in 1989, the International Ethnographic Film Festival in 1990, the Alaska International Film Festival in 1995, the Festival of the Native Americas in 1996, and the Margaret Mead Film Festival

Margaret Mead Film Festival

The Margaret Mead Film Festival is an annual film festival held at the American Museum of Natural History in New York. It is the longest-running, premiere showcase for international documentaries in the United States, encompassing a broad spectrum of work, from indigenous community media to...

 in 2000. In 2006, Drums of Winter was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry

National Film Registry

The National Film Registry is the United States National Film Preservation Board's selection of films for preservation in the Library of Congress. The Board, established by the National Film Preservation Act of 1988, was reauthorized by acts of Congress in 1992, 1996, 2005, and again in October 2008...

 by the Library of Congress

Library of Congress

The Library of Congress is the research library of the United States Congress, de facto national library of the United States, and the oldest federal cultural institution in the United States. Located in three buildings in Washington, D.C., it is the largest library in the world by shelf space and...

as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".